by T.C. Lo
Facing spiritual battles and secular ideological bombardments in the campuses for today’s young people are as real as the rising of the sun in the morning. Even Billy Graham in the midst of his thriving ministries had gone through such struggles and the concomitant agonies. So it should not come as surprises to the report that a good proportion of young people who just go into college had quickly lost their confidence in God and in the Bible.
A recent re-read of Billy Graham’s biography reveals that his spiritual voyage had nearly shipwrecked. But by the grace of God, his faith turned out surer and stronger and had become what I believe to be the greatest evangelist that God mightily used in the twentieth century. I prayerfully hope that this article may serve as an encouragement to today’s youths—and those who raise doubt about Christianity.
Here is my “Cliffs note” version of his triumphant story extracted from Billy’s book 《Just as I Am》.
“Chuck Templeton (note) and I (Billy Graham) went around together all the time on that trip; we roomed together and had a lot of fun, becoming real pals. A Canadian, he impresses us all with his knowledge of the history and culture of places like Ireland (p.100). By the spring 1949, I gave serious consideration to taking a two-year leave of absence from Northwestern to work toward a Ph.D. degree. A Bachelor of Arts degree hardly seemed adequate for a college president, and it did not help Northwestern Schools (p.112) in its pursuit of accreditation. …. To have or not to have a degree was not my only dilemma. My faith was under siege. In 1946, Chuck Templeton had resigned from his church in Toronto to enroll at Princeton Theological Seminary. I talked with him two or three times that winter of 1948-49—his first year as a graduate student—and discovered that he was undergoing serious theological difficulties, particularly concerning the authority of the Scriptures. My respect and affection for Chuck were so great that whatever troubled him trouble me too. I had similar questions arising from my own broadened reading habits. I want to keep abreast of theological thing at mid-century, but brilliant writers such as Karl Barth and Reinhold Niebuhr really made me struggle with concepts that had been ingrained in me since childhood. They were the pioneers in what came to be called the neo-orthodoxy. While they rejected old liberalism, the new meaning they put into some of the old theological terms confused me terribly. I never doubt the Gospel itself, or the deity of Christ on which it depended, but other major issues were called into question (p.135). The particular intellectual problem I was wrestling with, for the first time since my conversion as a teenager, was the inspiration and authority of the Scriptures. Seeming contradiction and problems with interpretation defied intellectual solutions, or so I thought. Could the Bible be trusted completely? If this had sprung up in my student days, as it did for so many, it might have been taken as a normal development. But neo-orthodoxy’s redefinition of inspiration to allow for Bible prone to mistakes and to subjective interpretations certainly should not have been an option for someone in my position. I was not a searching sophomore, subject to characteristic skepticism. I was the president of the liberal arts college, Bible school, the seminary—an institution whose doctrinal statement was extremely strong and clear on this point. I professed to believe in the full inspiration of the Scriptures. But did I believe in the same sense that my predecessor, Dr. W.B. Riley (p.45), had believe? Feeling a little hypocritical, I began an intensive study of this question. I read theologians and scholars on all sides of the issue. I also turn to the Bible itself:
- 2 Timothy 3:16 (“God-breathed writings” was an impenetrable mystery)
- 2 Peter 1:21 (prophecy came from the Holy Spirit)
- Matt.24:35 (Christ’s word shall not pass away)
The disturbing conversations with Chuck Templeton, my confused reaction to studying influential and sometimes contradictory theologians, the quandary over a career in education versus ministry in evangelism, and the most recently the fiasco in Altoona—all these were intellectual, spiritual, and emotional baggage I was carrying in the summer of 1949 as we began to prepare for Los Angeles, the largest citywide Campaign to date. I, as a college president had agreed to speak at the annual College Briefing Conference met at Forest Home, a retreat center east of Los Angeles, at the end of August in 1949. Dr. Louis Evans, Chuck Templeton, and J. Edwin Orr were there. Head of the conference was Miss Henrietta Mears, director of religious education at First Presbyterian Church of Hollywood. Her enthusiasm for the Lord Jesus Christ was contagious (p.136-137).
She had faith in the integrity of the Scriptures, and an understanding of Bible truth as well as modern scholarship. I was desperate for every insight she could give me. By contrast, Chuck Templeton has a passion for intellectualism that had been stimulated by his studies. He made no attempt to hide his feelings about me. “Billy, you’re 50 years out of date. People no longer accept the Bible as being inspired the way you do. Your faith is too simple. Your language is out of date. You’re going to have to learn the new jargon if you’re going to be successful in your ministry.” My friend Bob Evans, who had been at Wheaton with me, was also at Forest Home. He overheard Chuck say, “Poor Billy, I feel sorry for him. He and I are taking two different roads.” This cut me to the quick; the friendship and fellowship we had enjoyed meant a great deal to me.
I ached as if I were on the rack, with Miss Mears stretching me one way and Chuck Templeton stretching me the other. Alone in one evening, I read every verse of Scripture I could think of that had to do with “thus saith the Lord.” I recalled hearing someone say that the prophets had used the phrase “the Word of the Lord said” or similar wording more than 2000 times. I have no doubts concerning the deity of Jesus Christ or the validity of the Gospel, but was the Bible completely true? If I was not exactly doubtful, I was certainly disturbed. As the night wore on, my heart became heavily burdened. Could I trust the Bible (p.138)?
If I could not trust the Bible, I could not go on. I would have to quit the school presidency. I would have to leave the pulpit evangelism. I was only 30 years of age. It was not too late to become a dairy farmer. But that night I believed with all my heart that the God who had saved my soul would never let go of me. I got up and took a walk. The moon was out. The shadows were long in the San Bernardino Mountains surrounding the retreat center. Dropping to my knees there in the woods, I opened the Bible at random on a tree stump in front of me. I could not read it in the shadowy moon light, so I had no idea what text lay before me. Back at Florida Bible Institute, that kind of woodsy setting had given me a natural pulpit for proclamation. Now it was an altar where I could only stutter into prayer. “O God! There are many things in this book I do not understand. There are many problems with it for which I have no solution. There are many seeming contradictions. There are some areas in it that do not seem to correlate with modern science. I can’t answer some of the philosophical and psychological questions Chuck and others are raising.” I was trying to be on the level with God, but something remained unspoken. At last, the Holy Spirit freed me to say it. “Father, I am going to accept this as Thy Word—by faith! I am going to allow faith to go beyond my intellectual questions and doubts, and I will believe this to be Your inspired Word.” When I got up from knees at Forest Home that August night, my eyes stung with tears. I sensed the presence and power of God as I had not sensed it in months. Not all my questions were answered, but a major bridge had been crossed. In my heart and mind, I knew a spiritual battle in my soul had been fought and won (p.139).”
Note:
Charles Templeton—a Toronto Youth for Christ (YFC) organizer and pastor of Toronto’s Avenue Road Church, one of the largest congregations in the city (p.98).
